Slacker vs. Clerks - Slacker (1991) Discussion

[–] suckerdwsp316 18 years ago

clerks- A-
slacker- D+

one is a coherent, funny, and experimental film.
the other is an incoherent, boring, and experimental film.

whos the better filmmaker overall? well linklater easily, because he only went uphill after slacker. smith made a couple of good movies afterwards, but nothing too special...

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[–] Ninja_Skills 18 years ago

Good point about the directors of the two films suckerdwsp316.
Linklater definately got better while Smith just toyed around with bigger budgets but didn't really advance anywhere.

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[–] gg_277 17 years ago

Completely agree!

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[–] suckerdwsp316 17 years ago

thanks!

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[–] cocoamix 18 years ago

Slacker.

I hated Clerks.

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[–] Dollhouse_89 18 years ago

i think clerks was the better film, but i adore slacker.

"Now I know I'm always right; that's a thought that never even crossed my mind..."

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[–] cukkis 18 years ago

You cant hate Clerks.
But yeah, it shows strong similarities to Slacker.

But Clerks is like Slacker x 10.

"....All Jedi had was a bunch of muppets."

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[–] MTR_Unplugged 18 years ago

Clerks is my favorite, although Slacker is also wonderful, and deserves credit just on the basis for inspiring Kevin Smith to make Clerks in the first place.
---
#1 Wee Man Fan

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[–] j_frese42 18 years ago

slacker

clerks is an overrated piece of *beep*

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[–] Bob_Balaban 18 years ago

I love both, but Slacker is better...

"Hello, I am Dennis Hopper."- Dennis Hopper

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[–] style414 18 years ago

Enjoyed both, like Slackers better.

Both films are about equal in quality of dialogue in my opinion. I like the Linklater style over the Smith style of directing.

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[–] yonis-lawrence 18 years ago

Clerks.

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[–] 18 years ago

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[–] linkinlogs019 18 years ago

Clerks. Slacker was okay, Clerks takes the cake.

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[–] Quiet_Cookie 18 years ago

Clerks 5 words JAY AND SILENT BOB BIOTCH!

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[–] dssdecor 17 years ago

quiet cookie,

more like Dante Hicks and Randoll Graves

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[–] fobronik 18 years ago

Slackers WAS the movie that motivated Kevin Smith into going into filmmaking. He states it in his online blog on viewaskew.com. I haven't seen Slackers in its entirety (actually watching it right now). I saw parts of it before, but I'm finishing it now. I personally LOVE Clerks though, and Kevin Smith.

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[–] DrexlSpivey88 18 years ago

I'm a Clerks man, myself, but Slacker is a pretty sweet flick. The only problem that Slacker has is that it really just rambles without giving us enough moments of kick to keep me entertained. I know the point is that its all these real people and stuff and I get that, but Clerks avoids this pitfall. There are long stretches of dry, dialogue driven humor in Clerks. But every once and a while he punches it up with something like the masturbating old man, jay and bob with Berserker, etc. But that's just me...

Today I passed by a mirror. Now there's a reliable disappointment.

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[–] profiterium 18 years ago

SLACKER

"Around, I'll be around." -Detective Somerset, Se7en

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[–] silvercable14 18 years ago

Clerks, though Slacker was good, too. I think that Clerks just had more to it.

Savvy

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[–] afi_freak123 18 years ago

Clerks was a lot easier to identify with, being that I have worked in customer service. Plus the way Randal and Dante talk about subjects like Star Wars and 'jizz moppers' and things like that make it more realistic for me then Slackers was. BUT in all fairness I have only seen Slackers once back in 93 and I watch Clerks, sadly, a lot.

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[–] ratboyclarkkent 17 years ago

Clerks. I saw it first, and it's been a fave of mine for going on six years now. I just saw Slacker for the first time, which I liked a lot, but Clerks has the place in my heart.

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[–] 17 years ago

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[–] Minnesota-fats 17 years ago

slacker definitely, its way more inovative p.s. kevin smith is a fat dumpy troll

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[–] vbenys 17 years ago

It's hard to say. Clerks is more conventional because it has main characters while Slacker has none and moves from potential main character to another.

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[–] 17 years ago

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[–] blu23 17 years ago

you're kind of comparing apples and oranges, even though yes kevin smith was inspired to make clerks from viewing slackers. but if i have to give a response i would say clerks...it is easier to identify with and is a smart comedy. i don't care what anybody says to knock it. the first and only time i saw slackers was about 10 to 11 years ago when i was still a teenager, and i knew i was viewing something special and "different" per se but it was trying a little too hard. i think i also needed to give it a few years, maybe not see it until my early twenties. i would like to go back to it now being in my late twenties and see what i take from it at this point in life.

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[–] popthree 17 years ago

clerks is the one pal.....

btw slacker is a kinda film that is mostly relates to the people living in and around texas.........

but clerks is tremendously comic on one side and on the other side , involves some serious characters to check out....

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[–] donquixote1981 17 years ago

Clerks

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't Kevin Smith inspired to make Clerks after watching Slackers because he thought it was terrible, and he thought he could make a far better film?

Slackers just rambles. Boring. Just like Waking Life. It's not fun to watch because it's pedantic bull****.

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[–] ken_mustard 17 years ago

I think you are wrong. Kevin Smith made Clerks because he was inspired by Slackers, not because he thought he could do better.

For me Slackers is the better film because it rambles, sometimes incoherently, but in a melancholic, disconnected sort of way. Isn't that what life is mostly like? In Austin Texas, especially?! ;-)

It's all about the town and its influence on the people. Something I find brilliant. Clerks is great fun, but not quite so deep. Even though Clerks has many great lines, Slacker has slightly better ones, "This is a message to the underpaid workers of America. Every single commodity you produce is a piece of your own death!" The list of character names at the end is genius in itself.

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[–] thrillhousejhs11 17 years ago

Slacker.

Basically two films based on conversations and monologues; "Slacker's" seem much more sincere (One of the great lines: "I've got band practice in like...five hours from now, so I thought I'd be moseying along."), it relies more on nuance than explicit profanity to convey the slacker ethos. Of the two, "Clerks" seems much more nihilistic, something I suppose a lot of people relate too, sadly.

I really don't like Kevin Smith, he's just a dumbed down version of Linklater, and his die-hard fan-base who consistently deify his s***ty flicks are mostly idiotic and annoying. (Take offense if you consider yourself either idiotic or annoying.)

***

On a side note, someone above mentioned "Clerks" being an experimental film: being trapped in an environment for the entirety of a film is not only a lame allegory but a gimmick, albeit of necessity due to the low budget production--not an experiment (it's a sitcom cliche, for christ's sakes). "Slacker" on the other hand does have an experimental narrative, fluctuating between "protagonists" into almost like a "stream of collective consciousness"--it kind of perpetuates Hitchcock's sentiment in "Psycho" (without the sinister undertones of course).

________
The culture war is like a bar fight--and I'm your broken pool cue!
-Stephen Colbert

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[–] 17 years ago

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